On Tuesday, December 12, 2007, Middlesex County released its 10 Year Plan to End Homelessness. The event was held in the library of the Church of the Holy Trinity, located on Main Street in Middletown, the room where many homeless individuals had been sleeping just hours earlier. With winter comes life-threatening cold, the church opens its doors as Fabian's Emergency Drop-in Center, a winter overflow shelter.

The Middlesex County 10 Year Plan aims to eliminate the need for chronically homeless men and women to seek shelter in churches, libraries, and emergency shelters by ending long-term homelessness in the county by 2017. This is possible through the development of permanent supportive housing.

Philip Mangano, Executive Director of the US Interagency Council on Homelessness spoke at the event about the importance of a business-oriented 10 Year Plan in order to end the “social and moral disgrace” of homelessness. He also spoke of Reaching Home’s advocacy push for 650 units of new state-funded supportive housing in 2008 as a vital step in promoting the “antidote” to homelessness. 

Down the street from the Church of the Holy Trinity is Liberty Commons, a supportive housing apartment building which has ended and prevented homelessness for 40 men and women. Following this successful model for ending long-term homelessness, and recognizing the need for more affordable housing in the area, the Middlesex County plan calls for 303 new units of supportive and affordable housing in the next 10 years.

CT State Senator Paul Doyle was in attendance. Other speakers at the event included Margaret Minnick, the Rector of the Church of the Holy Trinity; Middletown Mayor Sebastian Giuliano; Kevin Wilhelm, Executive Director of Middlesex United Way; Howard Reid, Executive Director of River Valley Services; Robert Fusari, President of Real Estate Services of Connecticut; and Larry McHugh of the Middlesex Chamber of Commerce.

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FULL PLAN (PDF)